Last October, I had booked a group visit to this private garden at The Grange, in Chalgrove, but the chalk stream that runs through the garden had flooded, and so the visit was cancelled. I had been for a recce with just 3 friends in May 2024, and it was beautiful then, so I had been looking forward to seeing it again late season, since there are lots of grasses. (The owners only open their garden for private groups of 10+.)
Today's visit was planned a few weeks ago, and of I course was hoping for suitable weather. The forecast 2 days ago had been for sunshine, but it wasn't sunny this morning, infact it was decidedly gloomy, and chilly too. 😣
Route link screen shot at end.
4 Breeze leaders and 7 riders met at the car park in Ewelme, and since there was NO wind today I was able to use my drone to get a few shots today.
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| Almost ready to leave Ewelme carpark. |
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| First priority, a comfort stop at Ewelme Almshouses (photo by Linda) |
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| Amanda in the queue! It's 10.20. |
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| I love this house opposite Ewelme School. It's like a dolls house. Riders. Hazel, Linda, Gill, Sandra, Louise, Rose, Daphne Amy, Amanda, Jill and Anne. |
Bang on time, at 10.30 we are ready to roll. Today's route was 25 miles pretty easy miles. SO... why did it take all day? 😉😄
The day was split into 3 chunks. 10 miles to lunch around noon. A further 10 miles to Chalgrove for afternoon tea around 2.15 at the garden, and a final 5 miles back to the start.
We split into 2 groups as we rode downhill to Benson, continuing to Preston Crowmarsh. But much of the day we were all able to ride together since the route was car free, or barely any traffic.
( I had by chance ridden this first few miles on Monday and taken this photo passing through Preston Crowmarsh in glorious sunshine. )
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| On the bend in Preston Crowmarsh (photographed on Monday) Interesting thatch details. |
Once in Wallingford, we split for a couple of miles as we crossed the Thames, stopping for a moment on the bridge.
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| Arriving in Wallingford. A featureless sky today. |
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| 2nd group catching us up in Wallingford. |
Once through Wallingford we nipped onto NCR (5?) and through the very pretty village of Brightwell-cum-Sotwell. (I would normally take more photos of a village, but knew there would be lots of garden photos for the blog later!).
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| Passing through Brightwell-cum-Sotwell. The Virginia creeper adding lots of colour. |
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| Brightwell-cum-Sotwell. |
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| I was called over to see this "Red Box Gallery" in B-cum-S. |
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| These are photographs of all the dogs who live in the village! 😂 |
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| A "Newfypoo" What on earth? 😅 |
We were soon on our way, and after a sneaky cut through, to cross the A4130, we joined a short section of main, but not busy road, called Sires Hill, leading to our turn off to Wittenham Clumps. Our ONLY proper hill today.
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| Lovely open views as we reach Wittenham Clumps. All very flat around here, apart from the road to the clumps. |
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| St Peter's church, Little Wittenham. |
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A separate tower on the building next door.  Crossing back over The Thames at Little Wittenham, we now ride some offroad.  |
A good view of the Clumps behind us, once we had crossed the river and now joined this
track towards Dorchester.
I had been a little worried about the next half mile, since when I did this last May, the route between two hedges was seriously overgrown! But it has been well cut back and not a problem now. A left turn followed to a much wider track, towards Bishops Court farm. Our lunch stop was booked at The Snug. Link for The Snug. (We had found this on our ride last May.) Since our group was 11 today, we had also pre ordered lunches, and they had kindly set up a table for us in an open ended Marquee.
But first, as we approached, this handsome Alpaca came dashing across the field to see us. Such characters. 😂
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| A few more as we approached...... |
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| And even more! 😂😂😂 Rose and Daphne |
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| Linda and Amanda 😅 |
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| And this lot right next to our seating area. A couple of them got rather intimate for some time making weird noises.. Rather distracting. 😉 |
A great variety of lunch choices, and all very nice food. We also had hot drinks. There is a large seating area inside the cafe and was pretty busy, so I was glad we had prebooked.
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| our private Marquee. |
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| Sausage and carmalised onion sandwich |
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| tomato and mushroom on toast |
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| Smoked salmon bagel |
Our route now was to Drayton St Leonard, but since most ladies had not been to Dorchester before, I offered to do a short detour.... but went the wrong way! Sorry ladies. Next time. We completely missed the village, and the Abbey, but were back on course. A dash across the A4074, and onto a very quiet road to Drayton St Leonard, where I stopped for a photo of the berries at the church. Its a great year for berries, and apples.
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| 1.35pm, so we are in good time to reach the garden which is about 8 miles further. |
We crossed the River Thame (not Thames) over a small bridge not far from Stadhampton, and split into 3 groups now for a section of the A329 through Newington. It wasn't busy at all, but a bit uphill a couple of times, so prefer to keep the groups small. We regrouped once we reached the villages of Berrick Prior and Berwcik Salome, and arrived into Chalgrove at 2.15pm. Perfect timing.
After introductions, our hostess Vicky Farren gave us a tour of the stunning garden, with it's beautiful house too.
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| The front elevation of the house finally comes into view after a short walk through the first area of garden. |
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| A pond was completely hidden when the current owners moved into 20 years ago, and after removal of surplus trees in this side area of garden. |
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| The ferns looking gorgeous with autumn tones. The timber house added by the owners built using a tree which was felled. |
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| And onto another part of the garden where the stream runs through. (this is the first area to flood, if it happens)  |
photo by Daphne of something amusing being discussed.
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| Our hostess, Vicky, was very happy that I used my drone. (For speed I just used auto settings today.) |
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| Several clumps of Canna lillies around the large pond, stole the limelight today. |
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| Blue and white Asters. |
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| Miscanthus grasses putting on a great show. (sunshine would have helped of course) |
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| These seedheads were beautiful with the light catching them. I think Catanache Caerula? |
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| An Verbena Bonariensis repeated around the garden too. |
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| The bumpy textures of the fruits of Cornus Kousa Chinensis. I've only ever seen the white flowers on this plant, never the fruit. |
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| And we were all amazed to hear that this fruit is Quince! Like pears on steroids. ( hard so needs cooking). We all think of quince as a tiny fruit. |
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| The exit from the vegetable area. A little painting subject? |
Walking around a hedge screen, the big view of the curved herbaceous borders now revealed.
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| The Asters and Roses are the late season flowers here. |
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| Erigeron Karvinskianus self seeders. Beautiful. |
The sky now very white and bright, so difficult to capture the full dynamic range against the dark trees. Photo not bad, but drone camera struggled.
An excellent garden visit, which everyone really enjoyed, and apart from a couple of undulations, an easy 5 miles back to Ewelme, via the concrete farm track to Brightwell Baldwin. We left for home at 4.30.
We had only done 25 miles! But for Breeze ladies, it's not about speed, it's about enjoying the experience of cycling and where that can take us. A huge thanks to our hosts who will read this, and to all you lovely ladies for joining me today.
